Lifeboat Foundation

Surprised I haven’t seen more about this:

Tabloids reported over the weekend that a “bombshell” report found moving water on the Moon which could lead to “Moon colonization.” Obviously those headlines are misleading—there are no rivers flowing along the lunar surface. Let’s talk about what really happened.

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), a probe that has orbited the Moon since 2009, spotted water molecules being absorbed and released from grains of dust on the lunar surface throughout the day, based on the temperature. These results mark the only dataset recording the distribution of water during the lunar day, according to the paper published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Continue reading “The Moon Has ‘Moving Water,’ but Don’t Break Out Your Swimsuit” »

Robotics are going to become common in farming, reducing the need for back-breaking labor.

Feeling excited for Day 3 to start with Molecular Vandalism and what to do about it!

UA 2019: fb.com/events/2044104465916196/

UC Berkeley chemists have proved that three carbon structures recently created by scientists in South Korea and Japan are in fact the long-sought schwarzites, which researchers predict will have unique electrical and storage properties like those now being discovered in buckminsterfullerenes (buckyballs or fullerenes for short), nanotubes and graphene.

The new structures were built inside the pores of zeolites, crystalline forms of silicon dioxide – sand – more commonly used as water softeners in laundry detergents and to catalytically crack petroleum into gasoline. Called zeolite-templated carbons (ZTC), the structures were being investigated for possible interesting properties, though the creators were unaware of their identity as schwarzites, which theoretical chemists have worked on for decades.

Continue reading “Schwarzites: Long-sought carbon structure joins graphene, fullerene family” »

The latest creation from Softbank’s Boston Dynamics looks ready for actual work.

E-mail address: [email protected]

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3440-9774

Department of internal medicine, UT southwestern medical center, dallas, texas.

Organisms carry genes that result in certain characteristics when the genes are expressed. The possibilities for an organism to change thus reside in the genes. Animals and plants already have the necessary genes, but can turn them on and off as their surroundings change.

Several fish species can change sex as needed. Other species adapt to their surroundings by living long lives — or by living shorter lives and having lots of offspring. The ability of animals and plants to change can sometimes manifest in apparently extreme ways.

The cuckoo wrass is a fish species that lives in groups with one male and several females. If the male dies, one of the females develops into a new male. This can clearly have obvious advantages under certain conditions.

Continue reading “How do species adapt to their surroundings?” »

The new electric-powered drone can chase moving targets and fire at them till they are killed.

Mathematician Steven Strogatz argues that “humans have used calculus to remake the world.”